LB 

1594 

•Ms 



Tnn Art CLy:5 



OF 



PmivADCL.PHIA. 



4^ 



The (^laims of Industrial Art in 
Modern ;^ducation. 



Philadelphia 

Times Printing House 

73$ Chestnut St 




The Claims of Industrial Art 



m 



Modern Education. 



An Address delivered at the Art Club of Philadelphia, 
February 7, 1890, 

ir^WVMILlvER, 

Principal of the Pennsylvania Museum and School of 
Industrial Art. 



Published by the Art Chib of 
Philadelphia. 

iSgo. 



(05 




The Claims of Industrial Art in 
Modern Education. 



The Claims of Industrial Art in 
Modern Education. 

Never before, perhaps, has popular education, 
its needs and its importance, both as a public 
duty and as a measure of public self-protection, 
been more generally or more earnestly dis- 
cussed than it is at the present time, and 
never probably in all histor}- have such splendid 
endowments for it been made by private munifi- 
cence or so much consecration of intelligent 
and philanthropic interest been shown in the 
stud%- of the problems involved. 

It is really nothing less than phenomenal 
the amount of earnestness and energy which 
the movement has assumed of which we are the 
witnesses, not only for the diffusion of education 
among all classes and conditions of men, but 
for emphasizing in educational discussion the 
practical and industrial aims which have come 
to form so conspicuous a part of its purpose. 

Not only is industrial education, in some form 
and to some extent, claiming a place in the 
public school systems of nearty all the more 
progressive cities, and finding earnest cham- 
pions among the foremost superintendents and 
other educators of the country-, but in several 
American cities, recently and almost simulta- 



neously, separate endowments, the gifts of 
single individuals in amounts to be stated only 
in millions, have been devoted to this noble 
work. Spacious buildings have been reared or 
are in process of erection. Libraries and all 
other appliances supplied, including workshops, 
in which the use of tools and all the elementary 
processes at least, of all the trades by which 
men provide for each others' wants are syste- 
matically taught, along with, or rather as an 
indispensable part of the fundamentals of all 
education, whether consisting of the common 
English branches or of the higher and more 
special studies in language and science. 

I do not say in art, because while provision for 
art education is not wanting by any means, it is 
precisely the connection between it and industry 
and which I have indicated as alread}' made 
between industry and general elementary edu- 
cation, which is still relatively unrecognized 
and unprovided for. And it is because it seems 
to me so important that this need should be 
recognized, and this connection made, that I 
venture to ask your attention for a little while 
this evening. 

Two phases of this new movement are appa- 
rent, and claim, perhaps, about equal recogni- 
tion in current discussion. 

First. — The importance of industrial and artis- 
tic training as a part of all education ; their 
claims to consideration as necessary features in 
the curricula of the schools provided every- 
where for the instruction of children of school 
age among all classes, all sorts and all condi- 
tions of men. 



Secofid.— The direct relation of this educational 
aim to the arts and crafts by which civilized men 
minister to each other's comfort and enjoyment, 
and the industrial prosperity which success in 
these arts and crafts implies ; which success is 
practically synonymous in several important 
respects at least with national well-being. 

I have confined, in the present instance, my 
own imperfect study of the questions involved, 
to this latter phase of the subject, knowins; that 
the other and larger part of it would be pre- 
sented in an abler manner by one of the lec- 
turers who will speak to you later in the course. 
You will agree with me, when I say that it 
could not have been left in better hands. I 
question whether any American educator is 
better qualified for this work or is capable of 
presenting the subject in its broadest aspect, 
and on the higher ground, with easier or more 
certain mastery, or with more of the eloquence 
born of earnestness and conviction, than he, 
and so while I congratulate you on the ground 
that the matter will be presented so ably, I con- 
gratulate myself on my own good fortune 
in having this opportunity to speak before 
Mr. McAlister. 

The aims of what I presume it is not unfair 
to call the ' ' new education ' ' are nothing if not 
practical, and it is confessedly the desire to 
directly promote the producing and wage- earn- 
ing capacity of the generation that is coming 
upon the stage, that the philanthropic purpose 
and energy just alluded to are exercised. My 
claim is that one phase of the whole question is 
still comparatively neglected, is at any rate still 
far from receiving the attention and support it 



deserves, and that much of this well-meant 
effort will be little better than wasted until this 
omission is supplied. I mean that the key to 
the situation is really Art Education, properly 
understood and properly associated wath and 
applied to the industrial endeavor which is 
already so pronounced. 

And so I ask you to consider with me the im- 
portance of giving in the discussion of this 
almost aggressively practical question, a promi- 
nence to Art Education ; to the diffusion of Art 
Ideas, and the encouragement and development 
of the artistic sense, which has not been accorded 
to it, in this connection hitherto. 

Allow me to insist a little in this place on 
what I mean by this connection. I am not now 
complaining so much of any dearth of provis- 
ion among us for Art Education of a character 
suflficiently advanced, perhaps, to exert the 
desired influence if properly applied, as of the 
need of proper association in educational 
methods, of the industrial and the artistic, of 
the technical method with the artistic aim. 

What our industries lack is not inventive 
ingenuity or mechanical skill. It is not for 
want of deftness of hand in the management of 
his tools that the American workman is at a 
disadvantage, while for ingenious devices, and 
mechanical appliances of every sort, all the 
world gave us credit long ago for carrying off 
the honors of the age. Decidedly and unde- 
niably it is not on that side that the educational 
needs of the day are pressing. 

But we lack the aesthetic sense ; and our indus- 
trial products are without the charm which the 
cultivation of this sense can alone supply. 



It is true that the claims which we hear made 
on every side are of another kind. No words 
are oftener on our lips, perhaps, than those 
which proclaim our boasted progress and the 
depth of our interest in art industry-, indeed, if 
we trusted the phrases of the bragging adver- 
tisements with which our eyes burn and our 
ears ring unceasingly, there is no other industry 
at all. One would think that the possibility 
which Napoleon pointed out had been realized, 
and that the trades had all become arts and 
existed now only in. that sublimated condition. 

The word art has become the commonest of 
adjectives and is tacked on to all sorts of names, 
and used in the midst of associations so incon- 
gruous as to indicate that the very sense of 
absurdity has somehow been lost among us. 

But all this does not alter or improve the 
matter which we really have in hand. The 
ugh' fact remains that we are beaten on everj' 
hand in our own markets, by European manu- 
facturers in lines of production on which we 
have come to depend for most of that which 
makes for the graces of existence. 

As these are the things for which ever^-body 
pays most cheerfully the economical aspect of 
the matter assumes a good deal of importance, 
and deserves, perhaps, a moment's considera- 
tion in this place, although I trust that undue 
importance will not be attached to it by my 
audience, nor anxiety regarding material gains 
distract the gaze which should be directed to 
higher things. 

But whether we overestimate its importance 
or not, it will be worth while to note at what a 
disadvantage we are working as compared with 



our European neighbors, how feeble a showing- 
we make when the reckoning is made of how 
the nations spend their time and energy, what 
things they cultivate, what interests they 
cherish, what they stand for among the peoples 
of the earth, and how their service is rated. 

It is at once our good fortune and our reproach 
that the wealth of which we are so proud, and 
which it must be confessed all the world envies 
us, is a wealth in its crude form w^hich comes to 
ns as nearly like a gift of nature as it is possible 
for this world's goods to come. 

We are rich in pigs and cattle, in cotton and 
corn ; but as fast as the taste for higher enjoy- 
ments than those which the possession of things 
like these can bring is developed in us, we feel 
the disadvantages under which we labor. 

Look with me a moment at the material dis- 
advantages of our position. 

American taste is sufiiciently advanced already 
to demand in man^- lines of production the 
finest wares that European culture can produce. 

The Treasury reports show that we imported 
from foreign countries during the fiscal 3'ear 
ending July i, 188S, the latest date to Avhich the 
reports are complete, bronzes and fine metal 
work to the amount of $3,419,938 ; 

Of textile fabrics, $140,870,213 ; 

And of works of fine arts as the reports read, 
although a considerable portion of them should 
undoubtedly have been classed as industrial art 
work, $2,210,518. 

And we learn from the same source that we 
paid for these things in 

Wheat 65,789,261 bushels. 

Flour 11,963,574 barrels. 



Corn 24,278 417 bushels. 

Copper 25,303.337 pounds. 

Copper ore . . . .798,200,000 " 

Cotton 2,264,120,826 " 

Pork 732,016,656 " 

Our whole export of meat and animal pro- 
ducts, including beef, mutton, butter and cheese 
for the same period, amounted to $93,058,080 ; 
and there were of course other commodities not 
tabulated here as nearly as possible in a state of 
nature, and some, though not much, of the 
heavier and coarser kinds of manufactured 
articles ; but still with the whole balance of 
trade so much against us, that w^e had to pa}' 
about forty millions of dollars in American gold 
and silver to square the account. 

What I want you to note is the disadvantage 
under which we labor in paying for such things 
as these which I have named in the products, 
of which I have just read a list. 

It has been estimated by competent authorities 
that while a pound of raw cotton is worth about 
ten cents, and a pound of plain cotton fabrics 
about fifty cents, cotton fabrics of the highest 
class — ^of the class, that is, on which the greatest 
amount of taste and skill has been expended — 
are sold for, and are worth in the markets of the 
world about five hundred dollars ; that while a 
pound of raw wool is worth fifty cents, it is 
possible to produce fabrics from it that sell for 
five hundred dollars a pound ; and that while 
raw silk is worth five dollars, the highest class 
of fabrics produced from it are worth not less 
than five thousand dollars the pound. 

These are startling figures I know, but I 
believe they may be trusted. They have been 



recently prepared for me by my friend Mr. Lorin 
Blodgett, of this cit}^ than whom I believe no 
one among- us has given more thought to the 
matter, or is more competent to speak with 
authorit}- regarding it. 

I am indebted to the same gentleman for most 
of the statistics which I have presented, or have 
to present, in connection with this subject, and 
for the estimates and comparisons which accom- 
pany them, and I am convinced that they are 
only too true. 

The whole subject is exceedingl}' complicated 
and difficult, it is true, for an}' one not really 
living in the midst of it to comprehend or give 
trustworthy accounts of. 

But the entire organization of the Treasury 
Bureaus, and of their service of export and 
import reports, as it was accomplished in 1863, 
is due to the efforts of Mr. Blodgett, under 
whose immediate direction the work was carried 
on during all the years which inter\^ened between 
1863 and 1879, during most of which time he 
was Appraiser-General, and I doubt whether 
any living man understands the matter in all 
its bearings and in all its details so well as he. 

Moreover, as the organizer of the Board of 
Trade of Philadelphia in 1858, and for many 
3'ears its Secretary and Manager, he had long 
prior to his connection with the Treasury 
Department exceptional facilities for prose- 
cuting the inquiries involved, and for thirty 
years at least, whether recognized and rewarded 
or not (and I am sorry to say that he has barel}^ 
been thanked for much of his most valuable 
service), have been largely directed toward 
awakening American manufacturers to a reali- 



zation of their position, and to directing their 
attention and their energies to the necessities 
of the case which they have to face. * 

The idea which he has always enforced and 
illustrated by such formidable arrays of facts 
and figures is, that we produce and export vast 
quantities of raw material at ver\- low prices^ 
and import small quantities of the same material 
enormously enhanced in value and cost by 
manufacturing, and especially by artistic 
industr}'. 

That we export, for example, a million tons of 
cotton fibre in a year, for which we receive 
$220,000,000, but that for the insignificant 
fraction of this same cotton which we buy 
back again in manufactured articles we pay 
$40,000,000, and that while we sell twenty-five 
million pounds of copper and 40,000 tons of 
copper ore in a year, it takes all this to pay for 
the relatively inconsiderable amount of bronze 
and other fine metal work which we buy abroad 
during the same time. 

Mr. Blodgett estimates that the million tons 
of cotton which we exported to Europe last year 
had its value enhanced fully twent}- times by 
the treatment it received at the hands of Euro- 
pean workmen ; not onl)^ this, he shows that 
the American demand for the finer and higher 
quality of wares is steadily and, from the 
economist's point of view, alarmingly in- 
creasing. 

In the 3'ear ending July i, 1878, for instance, 
our importations of ornamental or decorated 
pottery amounted to only $637,485, out of a total 
importation of pottery of about four millions (to 
be exact they amounted to ($3,996,737) ; but the 

13 



amount of artistic wares imported has increased 
very regularl}^, and without a single break, 
until it footed up for the last fiscal j'ear to 
$4,247,001, or about two-thirds of our entire 
pottery importation of $6,476, 199. These figures 
show conclusively, I think, and a study of them 
in detail and by separate 5'-ears only confirms 
the conclusion, that all the tariff" laws that have 
been enacted, or that can be enacted, have 
proved, and will continue to prove, perfectly 
powerless to prevent the influx of foreign wares 
of the kind and character whose purchase 
abroad means the greatest drain on native 
resources, and which it is most desirable on 
many other accounts to have produced at home ; 
most desirable if for no other reason because 
the merely material advantages of handling 
wares which represent a maximum of value in 
a minimum of bulk are certainly considerable. 
Questions of transportation, of location, of fac- 
tories, of ground and floor space, of motive 
power, and that formidable list of expenses 
known as fixed charges, sink into insignificance 
by equal steps with those which mark the 
diminution of the bulk of the objects which 
represent a given value. So that just to the 
extent that our manufactures are coarse and 
clumsy do we approach in following them, the 
disadvantage of the farmer who pays for his 
French clock and the bronze which surmounts 
it by at least six times as many days' work as 
are represented by the clock and the bronze. 

I wish my auditors to think of these things, 
and to realize the extravagance and waste which 
their continuance implies (and a very little 
investigation will convince you that it is not 

14 



only continuing, but is rapidl}^ increasing.) 
But I do not want 3-ou to think of this as 
the only phase of the subject which deserves 
consideration. Possibl}^ we shall some da^' 
awaken to a knowledge of the fact that the 
moral aspect is of still more importance ; that 
these products which represent the most of 
human interest, and owe least to the material 
from which they are fashioned, represent also a 
dignity and delight in their work on the part of 
those who fashion them, and a consequent 
content and elevation of mind in the workman 
to which he is sadly a stranger to-day. 

jNIeantime these figures may serve not onl}'^ to 
direct our attention to the extent of the drain 
on our national resources which is constantly 
going on, but to emphasize the fact to which I 
alluded just now, that the demand for beautiful 
things, or what stand for beautiful things at 
different stages of our development, is quite as 
real and as constant a part of our nature as the 
need for food and shelter ; that it asserts itself 
as vigorously, and is complied with as cheer- 
fully, as the grossest of the primitive instincts, 
possibly much more so. 

For consider a moment how much, or, rather, 
how little is fairly to be included in the expres- 
sion " the necessaries of life !" How simple a 
shelter, what primitive clothing, and how plain 
a fare are necessary to satisfy all merely bodily 
wants, and realize how much of what our 
so-called " living " costs is given for something 
else rather than use, in the strictest sense of 
the term. 

To such a point is this feeling characteristic 
of the race, that such arts as building and dress 

15 



probably owe their origin, if we could trace 
them so far, rather to a love of display' than to 
any regard for utility. The savage man wears 
his clothing for ornament, and laj-s it carefully 
away in bad weather ; and probably the first 
house was built more for the dignity than for 
the comfort and security which it conferred 
upon its occupant. 

I speak of the savage, of course, onU^ because 
the primitive instincts of the race are best 
studied in him ; but what is true in Zululand 
to-day was just as true in Greece, and that, too, 
in times very near those which have exerted 
the most potent influence on all succeeding 
civilization. 

In the sculptures.on the early Greek temples 
the heroes of Homeric story fight naked as they 
were born, except for the stately helmets that 
adorn their heads. They have not even sandals 
to their feet, and no protection for their bodies 
except the small shield upon one arm. But 
resplendent in this and the well wrought metal 
work upon their heads, whose fineness of work- 
manship the art of succeeding ages has hardly 
surpassed, they rush joyously into the fight. 

And so in a somewhat different way it is to- 
day. Men will go to the theatre and the concert 
though they go hungry ; the French clock keeps 
its place of honor on the mantel-piece long after 
it has ceased to keep time, and in prudent 
households all over the world still is the broken 
china "wisely kept for show." 

The sources of interest which are associated 
with and due to artistic, rather than to utilitarian 
effort, are perennial and everlasting. They are 
the things which constitute enduring worth in 

i6 



the objects with which, as civilization advances, 
we surround ourselves, and on whose culti- 
vation, therefore, industrial success must largely 
depend. 

Now, with all our boas'. ed progress, this is the 
direction in which we have either not advanced 
at all, or have advanced the least, during the 
century or so of our history as a nation which 
has passed already. 

I cheerfully concede, without argument or 
reservation, all that its most enthusiastic 
advocates would probably claim regarding our 
progress in mechanical invention. I know all 
about the ingenuity and skill that have 
been developed and expended in constructing 
machines that " would do everything but talk," 
and that have been finally brought to do that 
too. I know how man}' steps are saved and 
how many tasks lightened by these appliances, 
and how comforts have been multiplied and 
enjoyment diffused by their means ; and if I 
thought that there was anything incompatible 
between the requirements of good taste and the 
artistic spirit on the one hand, and the distri- 
bution of comforts and conveniences for which 
the multiplication and perfection of mechanical 
appliances stand on the other, I am afraid I 
should have thrown up my case before beginning 
my plea. 

The inventions of which we are so proud, and 
which have rendered such signal service in the 
progress of the centiir}' which is drawing to a 
close, form a conspicuous part of the service of 
science in advancing the condition of humanity. 

The attempt to obstruct her progress with 
sentiments, however cherished, is to blockade 

17 



the locomotive with flowers, and whatever 
among our fondest dreams or fairest fancies are 
fated to perish that she may advance, her right 
of way is certainly secure, and as I once heard 
an eloquent preacher express it, " in the Palace 
Car of Science will yet be recognized the 
Almighty's chariot of fire.'' 

But no such blockading is implied. Art and 
Science are sisters — not rivals bent on each 
other's destruction. There may be a little 
innocent racing between them now and then, 
but nothing more serious than an occasional 
harmless spurt on the road ; there is no danger 
that anybody will be run over, and there can be 
no collision, for both are going the same way. 
And leaving our figure of speech to take care of 
itself it will not do to forget that our industrial 
progress in the artistic direction has been 
by no means commensurate with that on the 
mechanical side, while actual decline in certain 
respects is by no means hard to trace. How 
much of the more recent building in this city,_ 
for example, will bear comparison on artistic 
grounds with the best of that which was done a 
century ago ? How much of modern German- 
town, where the compirison may perhaps be 
more readily made than in any other American 
town, is not fairly shamed by the quiet elegance 
of the old houses which still give dignity and 
grace to its streets and lanes. Heaven preserve 
them! but I tremble for them every time I go to 
Germantown. 

And how about the furnishings inside ? Are 
the new chairs and tables, or vases and pitchers, 
and pots and pans, any better able to bear the 
comparison with the old ones ? Compare the 



piano that is in any of your parlors to-night 
with the spinet or harpsichord on which your 
great- grandmother played. Its tone is better, 
I admit ; but its tone does not depend upon its 
ugliness, and you yourself admit that it is the 
clumsiest and awkwardest object in your house, 
instead of being the most beautiful, as it ought 
to be, and would be if its outward aspect was 
at all worthy and expressive of its mission and 
the character of its service. Your grand- 
mother's instrument was gracefully shaped 
and delicatel}' wrought. It was made of beau- 
tiful woods of various colors, its legs and feet 
were daintily carved, and the large plane sur- 
faces were inlaid in quaint and pretty patterns ; 
but 5-ours is unrelieved by any touch of color, 
its lines and the turn of its machine-made 
mouldings have no more refinement in them 
than those of the brewer's wagon that just 
trundled past on the cobbles, and in place of 
dainty carving and quaint inlay there is only 
stupid polish, which stands for no nobler effort 
and the exercise of no higher powers on the 
part of the workmen who executed it than 
scrubbing, such as the door-step gets ever}' 
morning. 

No, I am afraid that in most of these cases it 
is with industry as with wine, and the Master's 
words, which I hope I may quote without irre- 
verence, are as applicable regarding them : " No 
man having drunk the old straightway desireth 
the new ; for, he s^th, the old is better." 

And this is so true that it is undeniable, I 
think, that the most satisfactory, if not the onl}' 
real progress which we are making to-day in 
connection with art industry, is coupled with 

19 



and based upon a modest and respectful study of 
what is excellent in the old work. 

The ground on which industrial education is 
usually advocated (quite apart, of course, from 
the question of its value as a part of general 
education, with which it is no part of my present 
purpose to deal), is something like this. The 
apprentice system has died, or is dying out. 
Our industries suffer from the want of the skill 
and experience in all branches of the different 
trades which the apprenticeship S3-stem sup- 
plied ; for which state of things the division of 
labor, due partly to the perfection of machinery 
and partly to better economical organization, 
and the spread of trade unionisin, are about 
equally to blame. The remedy being the pro- 
vision of organized instruction in the elements 
of all the trades, in the hope that this will fill 
the place left vacant by the apprenticeship 
system that is gone, and shall be by its philan- 
thropic and educational character secure from 
the assaults of the wicked trade unions. 

Now, without going very deeply into the 
discussion which these statements invite, I ask 
my audience to note that they fail to touch the 
real root of the matter. In the first place the 
apprenticeship system (so far as it is really 
gone) did not pass away a moment before its 
time. We need waste no sympathy over it, or 
fling away any regrets after it. Master and man 
alike are better off without it ; and in the second 
place we have done, and have so far shown 
a disposition to do, next to nothing to fill its 
place. 

This is not quite the right way to put it, 
because it is not so much its place that we 



have to fill as the work to do which it failed to 
accomplish, or which at any rate it could not 
have accomplished under the changed conditions 
which have come over the industries them- 
selves, or as the increasing demands which 
advancing standards imply are made, upon the 
workman. 

The need of the hour in America, if our 
industries are to prosper, is organized and 
thorough instruction— not in the elements of 
all trades, but in the trades themselves, carried 
as far as it is possible to carry it, and in art as 
applied to the trades. 

I am sorry to say that in most of the discussion 
which the subject has hitherto received, neither 
of these seem to have been accorded anything 
like the prominence which they deserve. In 
a vague and general kind of way, it is true, 
the feeling has often been expressed that our 
industries were deficient in design, and more or 
less earnest efforts have been made to supply 
this deficiency by the establishment of schools 
of design, in which verj^ good work has often 
been done no doubt ; but it has been for the most 
part either of so general, not to say elementary, 
a character, and with its efforts so diffused over 
the whole field of art study, that its industrial 
purpose is hardly apparent ; or it has been so 
purely technical, so much o'-cupied with teach- 
ing the mere methods of the designer, as to 
deserve no recognition as art instruction at all. 

On the other hand, such efforts as have been 
made to furnish instruction in craftsmanship 
pure and simple, have, curiously enough, been 
dominated by a determination which has been 
reiterated so often, and in so many quarters, 



that there can be no doubt of thedeep-seatedness 
of the error for which it undoubtedly stands, 
that the trades themselves shall not be taught, 
only smatterings and beginnings, onh* rudi- 
ments and fundamentals ; only the use of simple 
and primitive tools, and the application of the 
most general principles and processes. 

Now, I do not wish to be misunderstood, and 
so I hasten to say in this place that it is just 
here that the distinction to which I alluded at 
the beginning of this paper is to be insisted on. 
What is known as the Manual Training idea I 
thoroughly approve of as a part of general 
education, and I regard the school that bears 
that name and forms part of the public school 
system in Philadelphia as one of the most, if 
not the most, valuable and important improve- 
ment that has been made in our school system 
in recent years. But I am pleading for industrial 
education, not for the enrichment and extension 
of general education in the industrial direction, 
and until those who desire to promote industrial 
education, and are willing to make, as several 
benefactors of their kind have already done, 
generous endowments for this purpose, — until 
they realize the necessity of doing .something 
more than is implied by the multiplication of 
Manual Training Schools whose work belongs, 
and will be better done if left in the hands of 
the public school authorities, there will still be 
a chance to do some missionary work among 
them. If there are not enough of these public 
schools already (and there are not, numbers of 
earnest and well qualified pupils having to be 
refused admission to our Manual Training 
School each 3'ear), then let us use our efforts to 



hold up the hands ot the Superintendents and 
other authorities who are pleading for more 
support and more means for carrying on this, 
their legitimate and proper work, instead of 
starting rival schools to weaken the influence 
and diminish the usefuhiess of the public school, 
which, as I have just said, is already doing, and 
doing better than the special establishment can 
hope to do, this general and fundamental work. 

The special effort should have the special aim. 
The need of the hour is for trade schools that 
shall carry their pupils far in the trades them- 
selves, that shall instruct them in doing as well 
as it can be done, the work which the trades 
represent. The industries do not need begin- 
ners who are willing to learn, and have been 
started in the way of learning, but masters of 
their craft, trained as only modern scientific 
methods can train them in a knowledge of 
approved methods and the reasons for their 
approval, — men trained to a high degree of skill 
under the eye and the example of those who 
have gone farthest in these crafts already, and 
saturated with the influence of the best pro- 
ductions of the ages which are gone. 

It is all nonsense to say, as I have heard it 
said lately, that trade schools are not practicable, 
and have not succeeded where they have been 
fairly tried. Europe depends on them to-day 
for leadership in her skilled industries as we 
depend upon the sun for light and upon the 
earth for food. 

Go with me into almost any district with 
which a special industry is identified, and I will 
take you to the trade school in which that 
industry is thoroughly and practicalh' taught. 

23 



Look at the schools for wood-car\ang in the 
Tyrol, for watch-making in Switzerland, for 
furniture, and cabinet work, and jewelr^^ and 
mosaic, and pottery, in Paris ; for the silk 
industry at Lyons, for other classes of textile 
manufacture in Germany, and so on through a 
list which I need not extend. 

Such schools are not elementary institutions 
for familiarizing the pupils with the tools used 
in these industries ; they are true conservatories 
of the crafts which they represent, and bear to 
them the same relation that our schools of law 
and medicine and engineering do to these 
professions. It is for similar schools that the 
industries are starving in America to-day. 

I should be very glad to be corrected if my 
statement is not true ; but I am not aware that 
a single school with a similar aim to that of 
these European ones, carried on with anything 
like a similar thoroughness, exists among us, 
with the exception of the Textile School, which 
forms one of the departments of the Pennsyl- 
vania Museum and School of Industrial Art in 
this city. The department was established, and 
has been conducted by the members of the 
Philadelphia Textile Association without the 
use of a penny of public money until this 
department shared with the rest of the Insti- 
tution the annual appropriation which has been 
made by the State since 18S7. 

That other departments are not established in 
the same institution in which other industries 
are taught as thoroughly and carried as far as 
this one, is due simply and solely to lack of 
means. We need a school of pottery, a school 
of furniture and cabinet work, one of gold- 

24 



smith's work, and one of stained glass and 
mosaic quite as much as we needed this one of 
textiles, if these industries are to flourish in 
this countr\^ Meanwhile the school does what 
it can in giving to all its art work as distinct 
and practical an industrial character as possible, 
and does, let us hope, a not unnecessary or 
uncalled for work in this way. 

No, with all our philanthropy and earnestness 
of purpose, the needs of the hour lack appre- 
ciation and recognition still ; the movement on 
whose success better things depend lacks leader- 
ship, and the leaders it has lack support. 
Industrial art education means not schools of 
design merely, but schools of artistic industry 
carried far enough to set high standards of what 
such work should be. Schools of design alone 
cannot meet the requirements of the time ; no 
matter what is designed, it is on what is accom- 
plished that advancement depends. It is not 
alone artistic design but artistic work that is 
needed, and improvement in this last must come 
from within ; you cannot produce much effect 
on it from without. Every architect or other 
designer who hears these words knows well 
enough that in the things with which he has to 
deal design keeps fairly well ahead of our 
appliances and ability to execute work designed- 
It is on the executive side that we need 
reinforcing, quite as much, at least, as on that 
of design, and improvement in one direction 
demands rather than causes improvement in the 
other. 

How are these needed extensions of our edu- 
cational system to be made ? How far is private 
generosity and the public spirit of individuals 

25 



to be relied on, or expected to accomplish this 
necessary work ? And how far are the questions 
which I have presented in this imperfect way, 
matters of grave public concern which deserve 
an amount of serious consideration at the hands 
of those who have the direction of public affairs 
which has never been accorded them hitherto ? 

Does it never occur to the assembled wisdom 
of the Commonwealth, I wonder — either of this 
Commonwealth or the neighboring ones, or even 
of the assembled Commonwealths at Washing- 
ton — that a little less reliance on tariff discussion 
as the only thing worth talking about in con- 
nection with American industry, and a little 
more serious attention given to the claims of 
industrial education as a factor in the problems 
presented, might be worth while ? 

In other words, will not the wise men on 
whom we depend for guidance, and to whose 
hands we trust the reins of government, learn 
before we waste much more time and monej- on 
half measures in our efforts to secure industrial 
independence, the importance of taking hold of 
the other part of the problem, and, b^' making 
a sufficient provision for technical and industrial 
art education, train the next generation so well 
that we shall hear no more of this talk about 
our dependence upon Europe for the higher 
kind of taste and skill ? We have a good 
deal to learn, and the sooner and more earnestly 
we go about learning it the better for us. 

The State is fairly committed already to the 
principle of educating its children, and of doing 
what it can to promote its own industrial welfare. 
If it can regard its duty to the child as dis- 
charged when he is through the primar}' school, 

26 



it must still feel that its own welfare demands 
that his education should be carried much 
farther. And this is the thing- which it is to be 
hoped we are not too proud to learn from our 
neighbors across the ocean. In Germany the 
school is hardl}' less conspicuous as a part of 
the machinery of government than the army, 
and this is sajdng a good deal, — not the primary 
or at most the grammar school alone, as with 
us, but the technical, the scientific, the trade and 
the art school as well. Flourishing drawing- 
schools, practically free, are found scattered not 
only through all the cities, but over the whole 
country, hardly a village being without one. 
And what is true of Germany is true of Austria, 
of Switzerland, of Belgium, to a certain extent 
of England, and, most conspicuous of all, of 
France, which undoubtedly is well ahead of all 
the rest of Europe in its generous provision for 
popular higher, special and technical education. 
Indeed while other countries, Bavaria, for 
example, may have done as much relativel}- as 
France for art and industrial education, as far 
as the establishment of museums and special 
schools of a high character is concerned, France 
may almost be said to be the only one which 
has earnestly set herself to the work of extend- 
ing the advantages of this instruction to the 
mass of the people . Her example in this respect 
is magnificent, and quite sufficient in itself to 
give the lie to those who still fail to see that she 
knows what she is about, and is abundantly 
able to take care of herself. What France has 
been to Europe for more than a century as the 
standard-bearer of liberty — ever since, indeed, 
the despairing cry of parted Poland arose, 

27 



" Heaven is too high, and France is too far " — 
she certainl}^ is to-da}^ in this matter of 
education. 

It is, I believe, quite the fashion among 
Americans who ought to know better, to lament 
the Empire, and to draw most forcible contrasts 
between the ' ' strong ' ' government which took 
such good care of people then, and the some- 
what unsettled state of things which has some- 
times prevailed since. This kind of talk is all 
humbug, every word of it. Paris is not quite so 
brilliant as it was then, perhaps, but those who 
know as well as the Empress Eugene did what 
sort of a substructure this "brilliance" had, 
will say as she is reported to have said a few 
3^ears ago, as she stood on the steps of what is 
left of the Tuileries and looked over the place 
where the rest of the palace used to stand, 
' ' I like it better as it is." Although Paris may 
spend less now on her outward appearance than 
was spent for her then, it is not without a certain 
significance that she spent five times as much 
(about 30,000,000 francs) in the maintenance of 
free schools in 188S as she did in the last year of 
the Empire. The system of education in vogue 
is everywhere eminently practical and outspoken 
in its aim, which is to fill French industry with 
a set of workmen well trained for their work. 
School systems, as such, may be as complete 
in other countries, but nowhere are industrial 
educatioii and art education made to such an 
extent an organic part of the system as in 
France. This is not, perhaps, the place to 
discuss the methods employed in the actual 
conduct of the schools, but.it may not be out of 
place to say that manual training and object 

28 



lessons having particular reference to the pro- 
ducts and the industries of the country are given 
a very prominent place in all public schools — 
kindergarten, primary, grammar, and high — 
quite a nice little collection of objects called 
a " school museum " being furnished for this 
purpose. Apprentice schools for special trades 
are operated successfully in the larger towns. 
The thorough study of drawing in all schools, 
beginning with those for the smallest children, 
is compulsory. Great importance is attached to 
it, and great care is taken to provide the best 
instruction and to have the schools furnished 
with the best aids and appliances— models and 
casts — for teaching, for the old drawing from 
copies is prett3' thoroughly done away with 
now. In the higher classes, anatomj^ and per- 
spective must also be scientifically taught. 
This means that a considerable body of trained 
specialists must be provided, not only to teach 
the lower branches, but also to instruct the 
teachers and supervise the work of the lower 
schools. ^ This normal work to which so great 
importance is attached over there, is something 
which, for very obvious reasons, there is no hope 
of having attended to here until these things 
are taken hold of by the State. 

And this brings us back to the question of 
how much of all this work ought to be done by 
the State, and must be if it is to be done at all. 
If European example and experience are worth 
anything, the State must do a good share of the 
whole, from the most elementary and general to 
the most advanced and special. There is prac- 
tically' no difference in the way this technical 
education is provided for among the various 

29 



countries of Europe. The municipality usuallj'' 
furnishes the building ; running or incidental 
expenses are often paid by local organizations 
or public-spirited citizens ; but the instruction 
given is at the expense, as it is under the 
control, of the central government. The general 
expense of public instruction in France is at 
present rather more than three hundred million 
(300,000,000) francs, of which sum the Minister 
of Public Instruction and Fine Arts dispenses 
130,000,000 francs, the rest being contributed by 
municipal and township funds. These amounts 
do not include the money contributed by the 
Minister of Commerce and of War for special 
training schools under their supervision. 

It is hard to .see how similar work is to be 
done in America in a very different way from 
that which has been found necessary- in Europe. 
The philanthropy and foresight of individuals 
is naturally somewhat in advance of that of the 
government, and they can always be relied upon 
to make beginnings and to point the wa3^ The 
historjr of this same technical and art education 
shows that it has been just the same in France 
and Germanj^ and Belgium as it is to-day in 
America, viz., individuals and societies have 
■ headed the movement, have gotten schools and 
museums started, and have conducted the enter- 
prises long enough to demonstrate their useful- 
ness and importance ; and then the city or the 
State, or both together, have either adopted 
them as their own, or granted them such 
substantial support as v/ould enable them to 
carry forward and enlarge their work on a scale 
and to an extent which was impossible before. 
In discussing these matters I meet with but one 

30 



opinion among all classes and conditions of men 
regarding the necessity of greatly extending 
our educational work in the direction indicated 
in this paper. Everybody admits that if our 
sons and daughters are to know how to do 
things well, they must be systematically taught 
in well organized schools. Regarding the duty 
of the State to see them so taught tjiere is 
(unfortunately, as I think) not the. same 
unanimity of opinion. It is certainly time, 
however, that the matter was freely and fully 
discussed. For my own part I cannot doubt 
that if it were to be so discussed but one answer 
would be returned, for but one is possible. 

I have come before j^ou this evening, as you 
know, as the representative of the Pennsylvania 
Museum and School of Industrial Art. What- 
ever I myself have been able to accomplish since 
I came to Philadelphia is identified with the 
work of this institution, and it would hardly be 
becoming for me to dwell at length on this work, 
of whose worth or extent others must be the 
judges, and so I have preferred to speak rather 
of the idea for which the institution stands, 
than of what it has accomplished. 

I may be allowed to say, however, that we 
think this institution does stand in this com- 
munity for these ideas in a sense that no other 
organization aims to do. 

Founded in the flush of enthusiasm that 
attended the Centennial Exhibition, it per- 
petuates the impression and enforces the lessons 
of that event, and has, we hope, performed its 
share of the work of this kind that has been 
done so far. We believe that it has earned the 
confidence, and deserves the support, which will 



enable it to extend its influence, and to accom- 
plish, in the lines which are broadening every 
hour, the work on whose advancement progress 
depends. 



32 



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